arose as the young church began to understand that the West, which brought the gospel to them, was not virgin pure in her living and stand ards. Frequently it looked as though there was a double standard: one for preaching and another in livelihood, one for going to church and another for doing business. The impact was hard. The young church found diffi- .culty in making a distinction between that which is spiritual and what they * Jf *- On Being a Missionary “ Out where the loneliness presses around me, Looking on sights that are sordid and drear; Strangely abiding, yet surely God called me. Why do I wonder, if Jesus is near? “ Strangeness of living, strangeness of people. Have I not come with a gospel of cheer? Why is my heart then depressed with its burdens? Isn’t my Comrade, my Jesus, out here? “He who was God, took the form of of a servant, Humbled Himself unto death with out fear; Lonely, forsaken, despised and re jected, My blessed Saviour, my Jesus came here. ' “ Father, forgive me my failure in serving, Heartache, depression, regrets dis appear! Born of the cross, a new courage infills me, Jesus—my Victory—my life is HERE.” —Author unknown. X- * * considered was to be a practical out working of the message they had embraced. Then the inevitable, and perhaps the unavoidable happened; a counterfeit gospel moved in. And, as in the case of China, total collapse, and totalitarianism took over. Again the Church of God will need spiritual discernment to understand that irre trievable losses cannot be regained by leaning on the bruised reed of any worldly system or on men who may be Christian in name, but know nothing of spiritual power. The church in Asia must survive, as it will survive, from experiences from within its own life and not from look ing to or leaning on the older churches in the West. That has been
M IS S IO N S continued
a sad experience, but a new process is working, we believe, in China. The actual operation in this new process is painful and the mode of attack is startling. The weapon point ed at the heart of the younger church is greater than anything the early church experienced. It is the pressure of spiritual hosts of evil arrayed against the Church in a warfare. A strange warfare, not to kill the body, but to convert the soul! Perhaps bet ter stated, to destroy the soul. Any attempt to kill off the missionary or his Chinese colleagues en masse as in the Boxer days was soon stopped $t the high level. The aim is to put the Church in reverse and to use its meth ods to convert not to Christ, but' to Satan. The counterfeit is perfect—the language is all there: to “ wash the brain,” “ change the direction of thinking,” “ to convert.” The process is psychological. A period of indoc tr in a tio n , of incarceration and, of course, in extreme cases, death. Not since the first century has such a method so evil been devised to de stroy the works of God. Any mission ary who has experienced its pressure can testify to its insidiousness. Examples in the new process and its effects are both heart-rending and encouraging. The Jesus Family is an indigenous group of simple country folk. From its inception these folk have had no connection with any missionary or ganization. And long before the pres ent regime took over, they based their maimer of livelihood on the record of the church in Acts — “having all things in common.” It was expected that this group would have an excel lent chance of carrying on. Their record for piety and good works is excellent. Now comes the attack. Mr. Ching Tien Ying, the leader, is ac cused of being dictatorial and im perialistic. He has been purged; his faith held firm. Dr. T. C. Chao, the outstanding scholar of the liberal school in the ology, early fell in line with the new order. He urged others to do like wise, as it was possible that Chris tianity might be “blown out of Chi na.” He was finally forced to make a confession. It was repudiated, and he has been removed from his posi tion and placed in custody! Mr. Marcus Chen, outstanding Bi ble teacher and one-time chaplain to the so-called and now deceased Chris tian General Feng Yu Hsiang, quick ly reckoned accounts, and joined the Sino Russian Society for Cultural Re lations. In his confession he found that m iss ion a rie s had misled the young church in their interpreta- THE KING'S BUSINESS
The Church in Asia C harles A. R oberts , D.D.* A sia! The battle ground of a tre mendous psychological and spiri tual conflict. A continent of largely passing missionary activity of the Church. A younger church has been established and is now caught in the maelstrom of revolutionary events. A new generation from among the ancient peoples of the East has arisen, and has become intoxicated with materialistic ideas and mechan ical » contraptions. The doctrine of “ self-determination of peoples” is in deed, “new wine in old bottles.” The masses are ready to be led by prom ises of more food and more clothing and a happy landing in the future! The older churches in the West have a great heritage and think and move in free, democratic lands. For instance, physical suffering, hunger and nakedness has small meaning, ex cept as it speaks superficially about such conditions in far away coun tries. Then sporadic drives and emo tional appeals are made to render as sistance. In a land of prosperity it be comes easy to give tons of old clothing, and to send relief, even to push up the missionary giving by a slight percentage. With the airplane and modem methods of propaganda there is a running to and fro through out the earth to evangelize all the world. In one case there was the re port of one person who gave a thrill ing account of having evangelized in fifteen countries in five years! We wonder what the permanent mission ary in any one of those countries must have felt upon hearing this word! We simply state the fact that the older church in the West has its need of great discernment in her activities and methods. Are they truly Pauline and spiritual? When the ex cessive human effort is over and past, what will remain? Let China be a signpost! For the younger churches in Asia the world is a different one. They have, by a slow process of hard en deavor and many heartaches, come into the light, a pure light, so they believed. Then the heavenly calling in its earthly aspects took on serious color. Much of the light seemed to have grey shades, and even deep shad ows were cast about. Grave doubts *Dr. Charles A. Roberts, formerly super intendent of the Hunan Bible Institute, since his expulsion from China has been working in Hong Kong as superintendent of the Fraternity Book Room, which is associated with the B iola Book Room in Los Angeles. 26
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